No Room For The Inn?

August 03, 1989

Charles Fiske knows what it`s like to worry through the transplant surgery of a child. He`s the father who talked his way onto the podium at an annual meeting of the American Academy of Pediatrics several years ago to plead with doctors to help him locate a donor liver for Jamie, his gravely ill, year-old daughter.

Jamie survived, with a liver donated by the family of an accident victim, and has grown into a healthy, dimpled 2d grader. Her parents are now devoting much of their time and energy to helping other families in the same emotionally wrenching situation. They already have started a nonprofit Family Inn in Boston to provide convenient, low-cost housing for relatives of hospitalized transplant patients. And they want to start a second one at Chicago`s West Side Medical Center.

Everyone involved says it`s a wonderful idea, that it`s badly needed, that Fiske is an admirable person ideal for this undertaking. They have been saying so for months and the project continues to be stalled.

The problem is finding room for the inn somewhere in the West Side Medical Center. Fiske`s plans were put on hold for most of the spring while the proposals for new affiliations between the University of Illinois Hospital, Cook County Hospital and Michael Reese Hospital and Medical Center were debated and eventually defeated.

The West Side Medical Commission, whose members are working with Fiske to get his project underway, says it looked at 23 possible sites and decided the best is one owned by the University of Illinois. But despite approval by university President Stanley Ikenberry, the U. of I. Board of Trustees turned down the idea, saying the university has building plans of its own for the location. The medical center commission is asking the board to reconsider.

The commission says it could offer Fiske land south of Roosevelt Road, but that would not be as appropriate or convenient. Better sites are scarce or subject to other plans, according to the commission. Land in and near the medical center is rapidly being upgraded and increasing in price.

Fiske has been getting the runaround long enough. His Family Inn would make a humane and caring addition to a medical complex that often seems to lack both humanity and concern for people. It is absurd to argue that there is no convenient, affordable place in the whole area where such housing can be built. Those who would benefit from any improving of the medical center environment and facilities should cooperate in finding room for a Family Inn as quickly as possible-and do everything they can to welcome Fiske`s contribution to their own work.